exilencfc

I think that sounds ok Kokonutz.

Personally I don't see why there shouldn't be a public consultation period before any vote (excepting those that relate only to talkboard itself - such as the election of a president) takes place - it isn't like most of the decisions are that urgent.

I do agree that people won't necessarily take advantage of any consultation period but they should have the chance to do so. I would also suggest that there should be some mechanism to extend the consultation period if the issue proves particularly divisive but the discussion is constructive.

To me it doesn't make much difference how long the voting period lasts once a majority has been reached - it isn't affecting the outcome. In fact I don't really see why the voting period is extended beyond a majority being reached, given that the outcome of the vote cannot be changed. Unless tb members are allowed to change their votes?

I haven't ever been a TB member or read the TB guidelines so I don't know how practical this is but I would suggest that:

*After a motion has secured a proposer and a seconder the TB president shall post the motion for discussion only in the public and private talkboard forums and ask the community director to post a site wide announcement. They will also PM the moderator(s) of any affected forum(s) to ensure that they are aware of the proposed changes.

*The posting of the motion will be followed by a 72 hour consultation period with the motion available for discussion in the public and private talkboard forums

*This consultation period may be extended by a further 72 hours at the request of any TB member or the moderator of any affected forum. (Possibly the TB president should be allowed to do this unilaterally if they feel the circumstances merit it?)

*Upon the end of the discussion period, the TB president shall post a poll in the TB private forum and voting will commence. The thread in the public TB forum shall remain open, and the site-wide announcement in place, but the president shall post a note that voting has begun.

kokonutz

We've been kicking this around among the new TB members.

Here's my latest proposal for consideration:

How about we KISS this issue:

The problem is that the votes can get opened before site-wide announcements are made.

So let's keep it simple and amend the guidelines to say that voting commences AFTER the site-wide announcement is posted. No arbitrary time-lag.

We still have the same amount of time to vote because that refers to after the poll is posted.

And it takes the heat off of Carol/the senior mods to race to get a site-wide announcement up before we are finished (or even started!) voting.

And then, as a best practice rather than a requirement, we all take our time voting rather than rushing to vote.


Here's how that might look:

C. Voting Procedures
i. Once a motion has been made and seconded and all aspects of the Public Notice Procedures in Section D. below have been completed, the President shall post a sticky poll thread in the TalkBoard forum calling the question and announcing the vote. The thread shall be titled "Vote: [summary of motion]". In the first post on the sticky poll thread the President shall post the maker and seconder of the motion as well as the voting deadline and then restate the motion that has been made and seconded. TalkBoard members may vote any time before the voting deadline but best practices dictate patience before voting.

and

D. Public Notice Procedures
i. Once a motion has been made and seconded put before TalkBoard for a vote the Vice President/Secretary shall post a new thread in the public TalkBoard Topics forum announcing the vote along with the voting end date as quickly as feasible. Once that thread is posted, the TalkBoard Vice President/Secretary will submit a request to the FlyerTalk Host or representative to create an site-wide announcement of the vote with a link to the discussion/voting thread in the TalkBoard Topics Forum. The Announcement will be available until either voting is completed and a decision is made or the voting period ends.

Here it is coded in case anyone wants to monkey around with it.

This proposal can't go anywhere until the TB takes care of some beginning-of-the-term housekeeping, but I thought I'd keep the conversation going here in the meantime....

goalie

Bolding mine: How long is a "feasible" and does that mean that "in theory*", voting by Talkboard members could be completed before the announcement is made?


*or reality as the most recent case was

kokonutz

Well, Carol is not all FlyerTalk, all the time. So the idea is that she get to the task as quickly as she can. If she's on an intercontinental flight that might be a while, for example. So as quickly as feasible means just that. BTW, that is the CURRENT language.

But the whole point of this proposal is that however long that takes, the President will not post the poll for TB members to vote upon until AFTER that takes place.

Right now, the vote is opened and THEN the VP asks Carol to make a site-wide announcement. This led to the 'premium fare affair.'

Under the proposal the vote could not be opened until after the Carol posts the site-wide announcement. Boom, no more premium fare affairs.

MSPeconomist

I think we need to make mandatory the waiting period between when the motion is announced and when TB members can vote. Otherwise, we risk repeats of the problem with TB members being urged to vote quickly before FT members have a chance to react to the proposal being considered.

Best practices would suggest not only waiting to vote until after more people have the opportunity to post their opinions about the specific motion being considered, but also a more systemmatic means of notifying people that certain proposals are seriously being considered in general terms by TB sufficiently before the motion is formulated to allow feedback at this earlier stage too.

We really want to make sure that we receive feedback not only at the voting stage, but also earlier as preliminary opinions are being formed and the motion is being drafted.

kipper

I think a mandatory waiting period before voting is a good idea, in that just not posting the poll until the announcement is posted doesn't eliminate the potential for TB members voting without considering member input.

CMK10

For the record, there is no "urge to vote quickly". While I cannot get into specifics, on most of the votes we've had in the last year, the vast majority of people tend to vote quickly on their own accord.

SkiAdcock

Respectfully goalie, I think you've misinterpreted the above. First, the quickly & feasible verbiage you're taking umbrage with has been in the guidelines for several years - including the entire time you served on TB

It's referring to when a motion has been made & seconded the VP will create a new thread in the public forum (as has always been done) as quickly & feasibly as possible. The quickly & feasibly refers to the fact that the VP might not be on FT the moment the seconding of the motion happens (could be asleep, could be at work, could be on a plane).

Once that is done, the VP notifies the CD of the fact & asks the CD to make a site-wide announcement, providing a link to the thread in the public forum.

What koko is suggesting is that the guidelines be amended so that voting/poll in the private forum not be implemented until after the sitewide announcement has gone up, which is different than the current procedure.

goalie, you served on TB for 3-1/2 years. You know it's not the norm for votes to conclude within 24 hours of the start. You also know that motions aren't done in a vacuum, that discussions both on the public & private forums have preceded them.

This is attempting to address what happened with the premium fares forum situation without going overboard in response.

Cheers.

SkiAdcock

And without going into specifics, I'd like to note that voting quickly didn't mean the quickly was within 24 hours but was less than the full 2 weeks allocated to voting.

One of the reasons TB implemented the formal a motion will pass/fail notification process was so that FTers would know once a motion had the requisite votes to pass (or fail), even if the vote needed to remain open for the last few votes or single vote to be cast which could potentially go to full two weeks.

Cheers.

kipper

So, you are saying that the "vast majority of people" tended to vote without consideration of what forum members think?

rwoman

I think voting promptly reflects many TB members attempt to keep up with threads as they move along, considering FTers' inputs through the course of discussion, vice ignoring FTers' opinions.

Separately, as I continue to catch up (post HKG, post work conference, and meeting a deadline), it seems like no harm would be done in creating some space between motions, announcements, and initiating the TB voting.

kipper

Thank you! I look at instituting a voting "moratorium" of 24-72 hours or some such as a "no harm" option.

kokonutz

I guess I'd prefer to leave it to the discretion of each tb member to decide how long they should wait after public announcement before voting. Some TB members vote quicky, some regularly wait until the last possible moment to vote. Speaking for myself, i tend to wait a few days to see if there is a hue and cry that might change my opinion. But sometimes my mind is set. Other times I want to let the debate play out longer before voting.

But if folks want to require a post-announcement waiting period then I would want to see the length of the vote reduced by that amount.

SkiAdcock

That is incorrect. As a TB member I voted 49 times on motions. Some votes went relatively quickly, some went the middle, some went the full two weeks.

Motions are not done in a vacuum. There is discussion in the public forum prior to a motion. We do seek input, which is why there is a sitewide announcement on motions (premium fare aside re: announcement). Sometimes we get input when the sitewide announcement is made. Sometimes we don't get input or very little, even with a sitewide announcement.

Cheers.

dchristiva

I agree with this. To me, voting "quickly" does not mean "impatiently", but rather "expediently", taking into account the feedback provided by members. As SkiAdcock typed, sometimes that's within a day or two of a motion, and sometimes an issue warrants much more consideration and evaluation.